Thesis Advisor: Hypatia Vourloumis 

Thesis: Soliloquy of a Distant Thunder: Performing Nostalgia, Body Memory, and Aesthetics of Past Homes

July 2022

Abstract

"My thesis in part will be presented as a memoir, using several media, including film, photography, audio, and collage to capture the phantasmagoria of queer life in Nigeria, and how much of this life affirms and deviates from the stories that exist about queerness on the continent. My thesis will also “perform” the vernacular/mother tongue as language for this expression, by exploring my relationship to my mother as my primary educator, and the stories she told me of herself and the culture in which she was raised. Each chapter explores specific modes of performing this vernacular (object of study)—tongue sucking, eye contact, silence: din, non-verbal communication, which is considered highly important in private and public settings in Nigeria. To be engaged as a complex, non-linear narrative, I want to archive the lives of several generations using language and exploring the power of healing through the reconciliation and reclamation of personal narratives. 

My thesis takes themes I have explored broadly in my work, the place of women and non-binary persons in social systems, love and intimacy among minority groups and the power dynamics that shape our relationship to our societies and micro-focuses them by turning the lens back on my community and my interpersonal relationships. It expands on my artist statement that everyone is worthy to be documented, by practicing what I preach. 

My goal for my thesis is to divest myself of the pre-existing systems that determine artistic merit through praxis and redefine for myself what is worthy of scrutiny, documentation, and transference. I hope to come out at the end of this process a better communicator and a better, more grounded artist." 

Author: Dandelion Eghosa